en
Scientific article
Open access
English

The Norms of Thought: Are They Social?

ContributorsEngel, Pascal
Published inMind & society, vol. 2, no. 3, p. 129-148
Publication date2001
Abstract

A commonplace in contemporary philosophy is that mental content has normative properties. A number of writers associate this view to the idea that the normativity of content is essentially connected to its social character. I agree with the first thesis, but disagree with the second. The paper examines three kinds of views according to which the norms of thought and content are social: Wittgenstein's rule following considerations, Davidson's triangulation argument, and Brandom's inferential pragmatics, and criticizes each. It is argued that there are objective conceptual norms constitutive of mental content, but that these are not essentially social.

Keywords
  • Mental Content
  • Metaphysics
  • Norm
  • Social
  • Thought
Affiliation Not a UNIGE publication
Citation (ISO format)
ENGEL, Pascal. The Norms of Thought: Are They Social? In: Mind & society, 2001, vol. 2, n° 3, p. 129–148.
Main files (1)
Article (Accepted version)
accessLevelPublic
Identifiers
  • PID : unige:4887
ISSN of the journal1593-7879
560views
561downloads

Technical informations

Creation01/26/2010 1:19:02 PM
First validation01/26/2010 1:19:02 PM
Update time03/14/2023 3:20:19 PM
Status update03/14/2023 3:20:18 PM
Last indexation01/15/2024 7:27:11 PM
All rights reserved by Archive ouverte UNIGE and the University of GenevaunigeBlack